RE: Advice on VME processor cards and OS for EPICS

[Mark Rivers <rivers@cars.uchicago.edu>]

Hi David,

 

One thing to consider is the performance you need from the SIS3820 board.  My EPICS driver can use DMA to read the FIFO at about 40 MB/s, while using programmed I/O is limited to about 4 MB/s.  DMA uses some routines from Andrew Johnson’s VxWorks Board Support Package.  I think there may be RTEMs wrappers to use that Andrew’s API for DMA.  I don’t know if they will work on an Intel CPU.

 

Mark

 

 

From: tech-talk-bounces@aps.anl.gov [mailto:tech-talk-bounces@aps.anl.gov] On Behalf Of David Vine
Sent: Thursday, November 05, 2015 7:01 PM
To: tech-talk@aps.anl.gov
Subject: Advice on VME processor cards and OS for EPICS

 

Hi all,

 

I am looking to setup a VME crate and processor to run EPICS and synApps to control a STXM and handle data acquisition. Specifically I anticipate using a Struck multichannel scaler card (SIS3820) for data acquisition and OMS MAXv card for stepper motor control.

 

vxWorks is not an option due to price. Since I will be maintaining the OS myself and I am no expert I am looking for the simplest OS to set up and maintain and ideally with existing support for the abovementioned cards. I am comortable building EPICS and synApps on linux but I have no experience setting up a VME.

 

From my research I found two options and I'm hoping to get some advice on which option might be best:

1. RTEMS. The RTEMS source builder seems straight forward to use but I'd appreciate if someone can recommend a processor, or advice on how to choose one?
2. RT linux. I don't really know if this would work but I could use an Intel processor from acromag (link below) and install linux and run EPICS on it. Is there a VME bus driver and would it support the cards I mentioned above?

https://www.acromag.com/catalog/840/embedded-computing-sbcs-fpgas/vme-sbc/intel-cpu

 

Thanks for your time!

David